


Scarlet

by stydiapanic



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Character Death, Color AU, F/M, Soulmate AU, canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-02
Updated: 2014-06-02
Packaged: 2018-02-03 02:57:47
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1728548
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stydiapanic/pseuds/stydiapanic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An AU where you don't start seeing colors until you fall in love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Scarlet

 

Four weeks into dating Allison, Scott saw it. Color. For the first time in his life. They were at school, it was a normal day, Scott and Allison were having a normal conversation, when something changed. The smattering of freckles across Allison’s nose, the pigment of her cheeks were suddenly alive with something Scott had only heard about, but never really understood until that moment, that split second when he saw it before he nearly fell off his chair in the middle of the cafeteria.

"What's wrong?" Allison asked, concerned.

"I, um... your cheeks," Scott replied, gesturing on his own face. "They're, um," he couldn't help but smile, "they had color." It lasted just an instant, more of a flicker really, but it had happened.  

Allison returned his smile with a knowing look. "Yeah, I saw the color in your hair yesterday."

"What? Really?!  Why didn’t you tell me? And how did you not freak out?" Scott couldn't believe it.

"Well...I wanted to wait until you saw it too, before I told you. And about not freaking out... to be honest, I was kind of expecting it."

"Oh," Scott found himself blushing, realizing what that meant. They hadn’t been dating a long time at all, but he felt something different with Allison. Something amazing. And now he knew, now that they both saw it, saw colors for the first time, he knew it was real. They were young, maybe too young, but it was real for them. They were in love. In that moment, Scott felt like as long as he had Allison, there would always be light in his world. Well, actually, now there would always be color. He smiled again at the thought, reaching across the table for her hand.

Over the next few days, they saw more and more of each other, literally. Things they'd seen so many times but never really seen at all. It was easy to tell that Allison's hair was dark, like Scott's eyes; even in black and white it was obvious that some things were darker than others, but seeing the light bouncing off Allison's chestnut curls was an indescribable feeling that Scott never wanted to lose. It was literally like they'd never seen anything before they saw each other. It changed everything. Everything in the world had so much more depth and beauty, it was as if neither of them had ever truly been able to see before. Not even school could bring Scott down anymore, it seemed like everything in his life had lifted along with his heart, and they knew that nothing could ever really be that bad anymore, because Scott had Allison and Allison had Scott and everything was okay, it was better than okay, everything was alive. Like their lives had begun again, it made falling in love a thousand times more beautiful than they could have ever imagined.

Scott tells Stiles what happened, and Stiles couldn’t be happier for him. Neither Scott nor Allison had ever seen the colors before, so they’ve never learned their names either. Stiles teaches Scott the names of the colors he’s just started to see. When Scott asks Stiles how he knew all this already, Stiles answers that he’s been able to see them since the third grade. Stiles asks Scott about his favorite color, but Scott doesn’t have an answer, he’s barely gotten used to seeing them at all. Stiles admits that his favorite color is strawberry blonde.

 

There are bumps in the road. Scott and Allison are trapped in the school with Stiles, Lydia, and Jackson while the alpha lurks outside in the halls. “I just don’t think I can trust you, Scott.” Allison’s words ring in his ears, and the world comes crashing down. What does this mean? Is she ending it all, right here, right now? He can’t handle that, he can’t, not when everything was so new and so great and so much better- but it’s not over. Not yet. It’s just a break, he tells himself, we’re just on a break. It will be okay. He knows as long as he loves Allison he won’t lose this new sensation. He can wait for her.

He doesn’t have to wait too long. The formal rolls around, and Scott and Allison are back on track, just as Scott knew they would be. Lydia and Stiles are at the dance too- together, as unlikely as it seems.

Then come the days when Allison’s family finds out about Scott, about what he is. His time with Allison is cut short, limited to secret meetings and sneaking in windows. And Scott is afraid. He doesn’t want to go back to black and white, he doesn’t want to lose her. He knows that spending some time apart won’t weaken his new sense, but still he can’t keep himself from worrying. It’s all so new and so vibrant, and he can’t stand to lose her.

 

“Scott, I’m trying to break up with you.” He thought about those words, about what they meant. Breaking up with Allison woudn’t take away his vision, he knew, not immediately. He would wait for her, just like before. He would wait and things would get better and so would they, they would overcome this and they would be okay again.

Their sophomore year came and went, and Scott realized maybe he wasn’t supposed to keep waiting. As Scott and Allison grew farther apart, Stiles and Lydia grew closer. Since that night at the dance, Lydia was discovering that Stiles Stilinski wasn’t just an annoying, dorky kid with a crush. Annoying and dorky, yes, but there was more. He was sarcastic, and smart, and he saw past her popular girl image. He didn’t just like her for her looks. Now she laughed at the words “What the hell is a Stiles?”, and Stiles thought that maybe he wouldn’t have to extend his 10 year plan after all.

It was nearing the middle of junior year when the Darach had gathered the last of her final trio of victims. Stiles had thought they had time, thought they could still save his dad and Scott’s mom. But he’d been wrong. Allison’s dad had given himself up. They were at the mercy of the Darach now, they had no more leverage. He needed to be quick, to come up with a plan to save them all in time. Now was the time that he had to think fast and be smart and solve the problem like he always did- but he couldn’t. He couldn’t think, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t lose his dad too. It all fell on his shoulders but it was too heavy for him to hold and he couldn’t see straight anymore, his hands started shaking and his breaths came too fast.

“Stiles? What’s wrong?” The words echoed around him as Lydia’s face swam in and out of view.

“I think I’m having a panic attack.”

The halls blurred and everything merged together and suddenly he was in the locker room, and Lydia was there and he really couldn’t breathe now and Lydia was trying to help but boy was she _not_ helping. “Shh, Stiles look at me.” Her hands were on his face and they were cool and soft and he could focus his eyes on hers but he still couldn’t breathe and he couldn’t take this he didn’t know what to do, the hopelessness of the situation was a weight crushing down on his chest and he just couldn’t lift it. “Stiles…” The hands on the sides of his face gripped tighter as Lydia moved forward suddenly and kissed Stiles, and in the instant that their lips met she couldn’t tell who was more surprised by her impulsive actions- her or Stiles. Under other circumstances she probably would’ve laughed, she almost wanted to anyway, but then her mind went blank and she was kissing Stiles Stilinski and she couldn’t believe this was even happening.

Lydia pulled away from him, shocked at herself, and didn’t dare open her eyes. Silence hung in the room. That was good, she thought. Silence meant that Stiles was breathing normally again… or not breathing at all. She opened her eyes and a jolt went through her. Stiles’ honey-golden eyes stared back at her, alive with confusion and disbelief and a touch of sadness. And then she blinked and it was gone, and she could almost convince herself it was just a trick of the light, that she hadn’t really seen that gorgeous caramel color, that it wasn’t real. Almost.

 

Scott kept waiting for the colors to fade, for something to change. But it didn’t. He watched Allison and Isaac grow closer, and he and Kira grew closer too, and he kept waiting. But nothing ever changed. He waited for the day when he’d look outside and the trees would be less green, the sky no longer blue, and the rosy shade of Allison’s cheeks would be invisible to him once again. He kept waiting for that day, but it never came.

 

Occasionally over the next few weeks, Lydia would see something light up around her, like it was popping out of the background scenery. It was very distracting. She tried to ignore it- this was so not what she needed to deal with right now- and she tried to stuff her feelings down, push them to the back of her mind, but it was incessant. She’d turn a corner and see Stiles in a blue plaid shirt and want to slap herself because she shouldn’t know what color his shirt was and she shouldn’t care. She didn’t tell anyone, didn’t want to, but ultimately she slipped up.

She was spread out on Stiles’ bed while he was studying his bedroom walls, pictures and articles connected by strings, all red, though two other colors sat next to her on his bed. “What’s the string for?” she asked him.

“I use the different colors to indicate different stages of the investigation,” he responded.

“So what does the red one indicate?” The words were out of her mouth before she realized the meaning behind them. Her eyes widened and she almost slapped a hand over her mouth, not believing that she could be so careless with her words.

At first, Stiles didn’t catch the oddity that was her question, the fact that it shouldn’t have been uttered at all. “It means - wait, how do you know it’s red?” he sounded incredulous. He turned to face her then, because he knew what her knowing it meant. His face fell for a second, thinking she’d fallen in love with someone, with someone other than himself. And then he noticed her expression. She was blushing furiously, eyes cast downward, and silent.

He smirked, “The red string means its unsolved.” Her eyes snapped back up to his, hearing the change in his tone, and then she noticed his smirk. His stupid, confident smirk. She grabbed a pillow off the bed and threw it at his stupid face. He laughed. She had been caught.

 

Things had only gone downhill since then, like unbelievably downhill. Like, into-the-abyss downhill. It all led up to Lydia being captured, and the gang going after her. A group of (mostly) supernatural teenagers against a band of indestructible Japanese demons of darkness and the spirit of all things chaotic and evil. And not all of them would make it out alive.

Scott made it back to the battlefield, alone, Stiles having collapsed inside the tunnels and Lydia staying with him, just in time to see Allison crumple to the ground. He ran to her, caught her before she could hit the floor. He reached for her hand, tried to help, but something blocked him.

“I can’t take your pain.”

“That’s because it doesn’t hurt.”

Her words brought the world down. He was frozen for a moment as they took meaning, as those five words destroyed everything within him.

“No.” It was a plea, a broken sound that escaped him.

“It’s okay.” She said it over and over, it’s okay, though Scott knew that it was anything but. “It’s perfect. I’m in the arms of my first love. The first person I’ll ever love. The person I’ll always love. I love- I love you, Scott McCall.”

“Allison please don’t,” he wasn’t even listening to the words coming out of his mouth, it was too late, but it couldn’t be too late this couldn’t happen, it couldn’t happen to her. It couldn’t. Don’t die. He couldn’t say the word out loud. “Allison don’t, please.”

“You have to tell my dad,” her breaths were fast now, shallow. “You have to tell him…”

And that was it. The last words of Allison Argent. Grief washed through Scott, cold and lonely and unforgiving. It seemed to erase every other feeling he had ever known. Allison was gone, forever, and there was nothing he could say and nothing more he could do. There was nothing to hope for, nothing to wait for. Not anymore.

The last color Scott saw was the scarlet blood on her lips before his entire world faded to black and white.

 

 


End file.
